


writing wrongs

by silentsonata



Series: nice but inaccurate oneshots [13]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Art, Coping, Crowley writes poetry, Love Letters, M/M, Poetry, Self-Doubt, Whumptober
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-11-27 23:02:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20956361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silentsonata/pseuds/silentsonata
Summary: In which poetry is a coping mechanism for Crowley, who hates everything he writes.





	writing wrongs

Crowley is not a poet. He is not a composer. He is not a lover. Crowley is not a creator, he is a destroyer, has been _told _this over and over again, and he makes sure to remind himself of it every day.

_I don’t read_, Crowley thinks. He is right. Crowley is a listener, one who has lent an ear to John Donne and Edgar Allan Poe and Wilfred Owen, who once sat with bated breath to hear the formless syllables take shape in front of him. He tries to grasp those abstract ideas, guide them into the black ink of his pen, and translate them into something sensible, something meaningful, something beautiful.

It is the 16th century, after all. Creativity abounds. Evidently not in his own hand, Crowley thinks.

_Why did You break my wings to teach me how to fly?_  
_Why did You stab my eyes to teach me how to cry?_  
_No apple can, henceforth, be sweet to me._  
_Knowledge costs, and I gave it away for free_

The rest of the poem is scribbled out with harsh lines that tear the page and made even more illegible by ink splatters. It all seems horribly contrived to him. He hates it. None of the words have the depth he wants, nor the nuance and sensitivity he needs. The poem drowns in black ink and self-pity, and it is vulnerable. It can be dragged away from its pedestal of artistry, down through the oily sludge of interpretation, and become something else entirely. Crowley can’t tell whether it is him or the poetry itself that is selfishly emotional, and he settles, as do most people, on blaming him.

Writing, at best, is lonely. It is all give and no take, and all Crowley is ever left with is a page filled with sharp ink scribbles like black lightning bolts on a white sky.

Crowley hates the way humans talk about falling as it it’s a good thing, as if it’s _easy_ to get back up to where you fell from. Do they know how much boiling sulphur hurts? Do they have no sympathy for the people who stay where they fell because they are too injured to claw their way back up?

Some say that the most important thing in life is to learn how to fall. _Not if you don’t get a second chance. _Others say that, falling is just another way to fly, and falling headfirst is the same as ascending. It doesn’t make sense to Crowley. The effects of falling are significantly different to the effects of flying. Falling is uncontrollable, and it is the blossoming of pain on the site of his injury but also the dull ache that throbs through both his mind and body. Flying is liberating. No more needs to be said.

Crowley tries his hand at free verse, hoping that it is as liberating as its name suggests. It is the turn of the 19th century.

_Do I dare to_  
_Fall_

_Again, for an apple_  
_Far, far from my grasp_

_That I must corrupt, must rot _  
_Before it falls from the tree _  
_Watered by water so glass-like and pure _  
_That it _  
_Is poison to me_

_Drink, fool, from the chalice _  
_That contains the poison _  
_Which takes all the evil _  
_Out of your body_

_When you are done _  
_There will be nothing _  
_Nothing _  
_Of you left_

_Keep reaching _  
_The tree grows _  
_And you will never_

The poem lies unfinished. Crowley hates it too. The final words of it tug on Crowley’s mind every once in a while, but he smothers them with loud music and expels them with yelling. Perhaps he does not want to be liberated.

He never throws any of his work away. It is all stored in his desk, in a locked drawer, lest the one important person in his life finds it. This is also the one person to whom he dares not show weakness.

He turns to music when he becomes exasperated with words, listens to Paganini and Hans Zimmerman and lets the notes slither in one ear and out the other. Crowley doesn’t want anything in his head anyway. He likes it better when he doesn’t think, because then he won’t have to make the choice to ward off or accept his thoughts.

A small beige envelope is slid under his door one day, and his name is written in beautiful cursive in a familiar hand. He opens it like he is a museum curator taking out the most prized display the establishment has.

_The journey into the unknown of night _  
_Is good, not gentle, never has been kind._  
_And though the garden has long left my sight, _  
_It clings like English ivy to my mind. _  
_But quickly my white pages have been stained _  
_By midnight thoughts and quotes and midnight ink. _  
_Nocturnal struggles, twixt my growth, are chained; _  
_The moon approaches dawn and slowly sinks. _  
_And even when my lantern’s fuel runs low, _  
_The starry night becomes my steadfast friend. _  
_Recalling that, while in the dark, I glow, _  
_I love this journey though it has no end._

_You’ve taught me how to find the doors you see, _  
_And now the one to open them is me._

It is as if the poem is part of a book of spells designed to summon tears to his eyes. He is no teacher. He is of no help to anyone. He can’t be a guide, because all he does is get lost (and, eventually, forgotten). So why is Aziraphale telling him that he is?

Crowley is not a poet. He is not a composer. He is not a lover. Crowley is not a creator, he is a destroyer, has been _told _this over and over again, and he makes sure to remind himself of it every day.

Crowley is also a liar.

**Author's Note:**

> this is day 6 of whump-tober: dragged away (find [here](https://whumptober2019.tumblr.com/post/187356400823/october-approaches-and-so-does-whumptober-2019)) :D
> 
> [Find me on Tumblr!](https://silent--sonata.tumblr.com/)   
[Chat to me on Discord!](https://discord.gg/pTcajxx)   



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